According to an interview in Polish daily Puls Biznesu, Slawomir Lachowski, the CEO of BRE Bank, has confirmed that the bank is considering a greenfield expansion of mBank (internet bank) in Czech Republic and Slovakia. The decision is expected by the end of the year but needs to be approved by Commerzbank. According to the CEO, the new operations should be profitable in 2-3 years.
Our view: In our opinion, even if BRE Bank follows this approach, it would take a considerable amount of time for the operations to make a meaningful contribution to group results. Nonetheless, given the speculative nature of the stock, we would not be surprised if the news has a positive impact on the stock price today.